The Week in Small Business

Amid criticism for keeping credit tight, more than a dozen of the nation’s biggest banks have collectively pledged to boost small-business lending by $20 billion over the next three years, Vice President Joe Biden announced Tuesday.

Citigroup Inc. alone said it would provide $24 billion in loans to small firms by 2014, while J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. said it was already on track to reach $12 billion in loans to more than 150,000 small businesses this year…